


The Village of Shadow and Light

by Mertiya



Category: Thunderbolt Fantasy 東離劍遊紀 (TV)
Genre: Adventure & Romance, Canon-Typical Violence, Case Fic, Future Fic, Healing Sex, Hurt/Comfort, Lin is a trash boi, Lin plays himself, M/M, Multi, Near Future, Post S2, Rofu is pining, Sho is oblivious, Swordfighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-12
Updated: 2019-01-12
Packaged: 2019-10-08 13:59:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17387648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mertiya/pseuds/Mertiya
Summary: Shō, Rōfu and Lin find themselves trapped in the little town of Yami, where the monsters come out after dark.





	The Village of Shadow and Light

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to FrostandSilence, Zomburai, and umbel.

The faint sound of music in Lin’s ears woke him, and he lay for a moment with one hand pillowed on cold stone as he took stock of his surroundings. Lin generally returned to consciousness quickly—sleeping lightly had its benefits in his line of work—and this evening was no different. He glanced over to see another dark form on the floor, huddled up and snoring loudly. Trust Shō to snore.

            Lin yawned and sat up. The music was filtering in from outside the tiny shrine where they had taken shelter from a freak storm the night before. Lin was still a little unsure about this business of traveling with Shō and the bard, especially when he didn’t really have a current con in the works, but he hadn’t yet obtained the Night of Mourning, so he could hardly let them _go_ , now could he?

He got to his feet and followed the music to find that Rōfu was seated down the path from the shrine on a low wall, strumming lightly on his pipa, staring up at the sky. The clouds from the evening before had cleared, and a bright white moon hung in the heavens. The bard looked up suspiciously as Lin approached, and Lin held both hands in the air in a nonthreatening gesture.

            “I simply don’t sleep as heavily as the lunkhead in there,” he said. “I came out to see what the noise was. Don’t worry, I have no designs on your virtue.”

            The lute snorted. “As if you could take this guy on if you did.”

            “Oho,” Lin trilled, vaulting lightly up to seat himself next to Rōfu on the shallow stone wall. “How very ungrateful. If it hadn’t been for me, your charming master would be sword food right now.” He slid his pipe out of his sleeve, lit it with a wave of one hand, and brought it to his lips.

            “Are you really gonna stay here, pal?” the lute asked incredulously. The bard glared at him, and Lin sighed and settled himself down more comfortably. In the absence of a proper villain from whom to steal treasure, there was something almost comforting about being able to rile up the red-haired idiot. Not that Rōfu was a replacement; he was far too straightforward to be truly fun to play with, Lin thought. And yet—and yet.

            “What was it like, crossing the Wasteland of Spirits?” he asked curiously. “It must have been quite unpleasant.”

            Rōfu regarded him stoically, tipping his head onto the side, his green eyes made pale and luminous by the white moonlight. “It was lonely,” he said; the pipa made a surprised jangling noise.

            “And of course you had no need to,” Lin continued.

            “I had every need to,” the bard replied coolly. Ah, so it was like that, Lin thought, following the unconscious glance the boy gave back towards the shrine. Well, it made sense, he supposed, even if it was a rather transparent motivation. For a moment, he toyed with the thought of seducing the bard and then abandoning him, but he didn’t particularly think he wanted to see the look on Shō’s face if he did that. He was getting soft in his old age. Besides, there wouldn’t be much challenge to something like that.

            “So what are you doing out here anyway?” he asked cheerfully, blowing a puff of white smoke at Rōfu. The bard wrinkled his nose but waited for it to pass; then he shrugged and looked down at Ryouga.

            “You…really want me to tell him?” the pipa sounded surprised. Rōfu gave him a nod. “Okay, well, it’s your funeral. This guy was having nightmares.”

            “Nightmares?” echoed Lin, his surprise at the response showing in the fact that he hadn’t really thought through what he was saying or asking.

            Rōfu strummed out a soft waterfall of notes in answer; though he didn’t actually say what the nightmares had been, Lin could feel the loneliness emanating from the short musical phrase. “Should I fetch Shō?” he asked, a little uncomfortably. He hadn’t expected to receive such uncomplicated, naked emotion in response to his transparent needling.

            The bard shook his head and leaned back, strumming gently on the lute again.

            “Well, what do you want then?” Lin asked, feeling uncharacteristically irritable that he hadn’t even warranted a verbal response.

            He got a raised eyebrow and a fluttered glance down at the pipa, which appeared to mean, _I’m perfectly happy here, thank you very much_. Still feeling vaguely ruffled for no reason he could put his finger on, Lin laughed lightly and leaned back against the tree behind him, drawing in another lungful of smoke. He would need to watch the bard closely to make certain he understood him if they were to be traveling together.

~

            Rōfu jerked to wakefulness, pressing a hand to his mouth to keep from making a noise, an instinctive habit that had only become more ingrained during his sojourn in the Wasteland of Spirits. What had woken him? The noise of someone moving with light footsteps near Shō’s sleeping form. Carefully, noiselessly, Rōfu reached sideways for Ryouga, then rolled up onto one knee, ready to strike.

            It was Lin, bent over Shō’s pack and rifling through it. Rōfu spun Ryouga into a sword and shoved the point forward into Lin’s lower back in a way that had to be uncomfortable. The Enigmatic Gale jumped, glancing around. “Ouch,” he said, making a wounded face. “Am I no longer allowed to get myself a midnight snack?”

            Rōfu’s eyes went from Shō’s sleeping form and the obvious corner of the Sorcerous Sword Index poking out from beneath his arms to the stick of jerky in Lin’s hand. Grimacing, he lowered Ryouga and shrugged. “Hey, man, if you don’t want to get poked at, maybe try not looking so shifty,” Ryouga said.

            “I was not expecting you to wake so easily,” Lin replied, and Rōfu crossed his arms. All the more reason not to trust him. The Enigmatic Gale tossed his hair irritably. “If I were actually trying to steal something from him, I certainly wouldn’t be careless enough to let you catch me at it.”

            “Doesn’t look like you were expecting us to catch you,” Ryouga pointed out, and Lin sighed.

            “Please,” he said. “There was little point in being careful when all I wanted was a stick of jerky.”            

            “For all we know, that’s the Night of Mourning and you’re puffing more of that weird smoke shit on us.”

            Lin groaned. “Here.” He tossed it over, and Rōfu caught it automatically. “Take a bite.” He flashed an insouciant grin that didn’t reach his eyes. Staring him down, Rōfu did exactly as he’d been told, relaxing slightly as his teeth bit into the chewy sweet-salt of the jerky. “Now can I—” Lin paused irritably. “It appears our unreliable traveling companion has devoured the rest. That was the last stick.”

            Rōfu couldn’t help the amusement from rising to his face. They could acquire more food tomorrow, but the expression of irritable chagrin on Lin’s face was—pleasant. More pleasant than Rōfu was sure he liked. He didn’t want to end up like the thief himself, gaining pleasure from the misfortune of others. He offered the bitten-off stick back.

            “How romantic,” Lin told him, taking it with a vulpine smile. “Wouldn’t you prefer to share such an indirect kiss with Shō?”

            Heat bloomed in Rōfu’s cheeks, and he couldn’t stop the look he shot over towards the Edgeless Blade, who snorted and stirred in his sleep. Lin hummed, confirming that Rōfu’s reaction had been the worst he could possibly have had. “You could just break off the part he slobbered on, ya know,” Ryouga said.

            “I could,” smiled Lin. “I hardly see any need to, however.” With every appearance of delight, he actually licked a stripe up the stick of jerky, sucked it into his mouth and then slowly bit off a chunk. “So, how does it feel, Princess?” he asked, eyes shining brightly.

            “The fuck did you call him?” Ryouga sounded less angry than bemused. Lin gestured towards Rōfu’s hair, and Rōfu grimaced at him, jangled Ryouga loudly in his general direction, and stalked away from their campsite to find somewhere to calm down.

~

            Shō couldn’t tell if Rōfu and Lin were going to kill each other or were learning to get along. They fought well together; on the few occasions that the three of them had been ambushed on the road by bandits, or, on one notable occasion by the remains of the Onyx Demons, Lin had the enemies bumbling around in confusion while Rōfu sent them flying in droves. Shō barely had to do anything, which was just how he liked it.

            Having said that, they sniped at each other constantly—or rather, Lin and Ryouga did. Rōfu was no more talkative than usual, and just constantly glared at the back of Lin’s head. Also, for some reason, they went through a lot of meat jerky.

            About a month after the fight with Seven Blasphemous Deaths, the three of them reached a medium-sized town as the sun was setting. They’d only taken a few steps down the central path when Rōfu paused, looking uncertain.

            “What is it?” Shō asked him immediately, and Rōfu raised a hand for silence, frowning. He shut his eyes, strumming a soft, eerie little tune on Ryouga. “Something’s wrong,” he said curtly after a moment.

            “How very specific,” Lin said archly, but he didn’t sound as dismissive as Shō had half-expected. Rōfu shot him one of his usual glares.

            “We should get inside,” he said tersely. A lone villager passed them on the street, hurrying towards a brightly-lit temple at the top of the hill. She paused for a moment, beckoning them.

            “Hurry!” she said. Shō glanced over at Lin and Rōfu, and the three of them began to walk faster; even Lin seemed relatively serious. At the edge of the pathway, the shadows seemed to writhe like living things.

            They were halfway to the top when one of them darted forward, the inky darkness wrapping around the limb of the woman who had called out to them. Shō stared, grasping for his sword a little too late. It was Rōfu who responded the most quickly, raising Ryouga and sending a blast of strident sound toward it. The red gleam of his _qi_ cut through the tentacle, and it snapped back to the side of the road. An eerie keening noise rose up, only distinguishable from the wind because of the chilling stillness in the street. “Thank you,” the woman gasped, and she began to run.

            The three travelers followed, the shadows lengthening around them as the light dimmed. The sun was on its last few gleams as they caught up with the woman and all four of them swept through the door of the temple. The woman slammed it shut behind them, gasping, and then slumped back against it.

            The inside of the temple was extraordinarily well-lit. Candles of various natures covered half the floor and every crack or ledge on the wall. “Huh,” Shō said.

            “Intriguing,” Lin agreed.

            “Thank you again,” said the woman Rōfu had saved, panting hard and leaning back against the door. She was a tall woman in flowing yellow robes that looked as if they had at one time been quite expensive. They were now dirtied and rather threadbare. “I am Mari Hotaru, the wife of Mari Tsubasa, the priest of this temple.” A little unsteadily, she straightened up and bowed to the three of them. “You are welcome to shelter here.”

            Lin bowed back to her, assuming an air of some importance as he stepped slightly forward. “I am Kicho, a traveling merchant, and these are my two companions. Thank you for your offer of hospitality.”

            “Hotaru!” A man appeared from the back of the temple and ran past the three of them without even a glance. “You’re all right! I was afraid—”

            “I went to see that the Mei children had a well-lit home after what happened last night,” she said as her husband took her hand and held it in what appeared to be a bruising grip. Shō, embarrassed, looked away. Rōfu was looking away at the same time, and they caught each other’s eyes. To Shō’s surprise, the bard blushed a deep red and then stared down at his feet. “These men kept the demons from getting me.”

            “Then I am eternally grateful to them.”

            “May I ask what demons, precisely, we were fortunate enough to be able to save you from?” Lin put in, sharp curiosity lacing his voice.

            The woman sighed heavily. “Yami is cursed,” she explained. “As the story goes, many years ago, our town was ruled by an evil demon. A wandering hero named Hikaru battled it and sealed it away, but several years ago, something terrible must have happened to the seal, because the demons returned and our town was cut off from the rest of Dong Li.” She paused, giving them an almost suspicious look. “You are the first men to be able to penetrate the barrier.”

“Oho, intriguing,” Lin said. “And what is the form that this curse takes?”

            “I will tell you, but first we must check the lights and the barriers. Tsubasa, how many do we have sheltering with us tonight?”

            “Five in addition to these three,” her husband said seriously, as the two of them led the way through the temple. Shō noticed that they paused every few meters to inspect the candles lining the walls.

            “Only five? I thought there were six.”

            Sigh. “The youngest child did not return quickly enough as darkness was falling.”

            Shō frowned at the way Hotaru’s face turned grim. “So it’s the darkness that’s bad?” he asked.

            She nodded. “It— _feeds_.” They paused at a candle that was flickering slightly in an unseen draft, and she frowned, moving it slightly. “Anyone who is trapped outside at night—many of them disappear. Those who are found are usually dead and cold, with no visible injuries.”

            “Hmmm.” Lin made a noise like a doctor diagnosing a particularly troublesome patient. “A troubling circumstance, indeed.” Shō felt someone brush against his side, and glanced to the right to see that Rōfu had moved closer to him, his face a little pinched.

            “Is that all you can say?” Ryouga put in petulantly. “ ‘Troubling circumstance?’ A kid just _died_.”

            “And is that not troubling?” To Shō’s surprise, Lin reached over and ran a hand through Rōfu’s hair. The bard blinked at him; Lin blinked back. For a moment, Shō felt certain he hadn’t intended to do such a thing. The next he shook his head at himself for ascribing human motivation to the inscrutable Enigmatic Gale.

            They passed from the main central room of the temple into a smaller back room that was also covered in candles. Not a single shadow flickered or held sway anywhere inside it; even the corners were alight with the brilliant wash of light. To one side, an exhausted-looking woman in a ragged dress lay curled with her eyes shut, her dark-circled eyes relaxed a little in sleep. Four children of varying ages sat near her; one of the little girls braided her sister’s hair, while one of the little boys spun a crude wooden top and the other simply leaned against the bed, his eyes drooping a little. All four looked up as the others entered. The child who had been apparently falling asleep sat up with a little gasp, pulled his legs into his chest, and then started wailing.

            Shō pushed his hair back from his forehead, trying to think of a way to distract the kid, but before he’d gotten very far, Rōfu stepped forward, playing a jaunty little melody on Ryouga, and gave a sweeping bow to all four of them. He paused for long enough to let Ryouga say, “We take requests!” and then seated himself in the middle of all four of them with an unusually tender expression on his face.

            “Huh,” said Shō. Unexpected as it was for Rōfu to be so—outgoing?—it was even more unexpected that the children immediately crowded around him.

            “My, my, it seems your friend has some hidden talents,” Lin commented. The pleasant tune was even quiet enough that it didn’t seem to have woken the woman sleeping on the bed, although that might have been simply a matter of how exhausted she was.

            Lin turned back to Hotaru. “I take it from what you said earlier that since this began you have not been able to—ah—depart?”

            “That’s right.” She sighed. “Some of the wealthier men and women have been able to seal up their homes with blessings and wards, and of course, the temple is relatively safe, but there are those who have nowhere else to go.”

            “Hmmm. A difficult conundrum, indeed.”

            “Thanks for your hospitality,” Shō put in, and Hotaru nodded.

            “I’m afraid we don’t have much to offer you in the way of sleeping accommodations,” she said.

            “Ah, we’ve been sleeping out of doors, this is no problem.” Shō waved a hand. “You might have trouble prying the kids away from Rōfu, though, it looks like.” Ryouga was making faces at them as Rōfu hummed a soft little tune, and one of the little girls was shyly unbraiding one of his braids.

            “Why don’t we leave them alone for a little?” Lin suggested. “Surely there are other rooms we might spend time in, even if they are not built for sleeping?”

            Hotaru nodded. “If you do not mind, there is a storage room near the back, still well-lit.”

            “That sounds quite perfect,” Lin agreed. “Sir Shō?”

            “Yeah, I guess we might as well get some sleep,” Shō said, shaking himself out of what felt like almost a dazed state. Watching Rōfu play with those children—it made him feel a little strange instead, as if his chest were too tight for some reason. He glanced back as they left. Rōfu was actually laughing with one of the children sitting in his lap and running her fingers down along Ryouga’s bridge.

~

            Lin was more thankful than he really felt he ought to have been for a potentially deadly distraction. Traveling with Shō and Rōfu was strange. He didn’t like it. Perhaps he did. He couldn’t decide, and that at least he knew he didn’t like. The evenings of stolen time with Rōfu, when they sat together or talked together or—did other things—when Shō was asleep left him with a warmth in his chest he wasn’t sure he’d ever felt before. Two evenings ago, he’d caught himself watching Shō as he slept and had brushed a lock of his hair out of his eyes. He needed a distraction and being trapped in a cursed town with his life potentially in danger certainly counted.

            He’d woken with the certainty inside his chest that it was dawn, although he had waited until Hotaru had confirmed his assumption before opening the door—there was no sense in being careless.

            “Out enjoying the sunlight?” Shō said, coming up behind him as he stared out into the early morning light.

            Lin nearly choked on his own smoke, but he managed to reply with his usual insouciance, “Ah, Sir Shō, I am enjoying the puzzle of the town.”

            Shō grinned at him. “Would you like to see something really cute?”

            “Cute?” Lin echoed, slightly puzzled.

            “C’mon.” He led Lin back into the little room from the night before. The woman was still sleeping on her little pallet. In the corner, Rōfu was huddled back against the wall, to all intents and purposes apparently asleep with his head tipped back. One of the children was curled up against his mother; the other three were cuddled up to Rōfu, one on each side and the smallest girl a little round ball in his lap. Lin stared, took a long breath of smoke, stared again.

            “I had no idea your friend was so domestic,” he said lightly.

            The pipa, leaning against the wall near Rōfu’s shoulder, cracked open both eyes and made a shushing noise. “He was up all night trying to calm them down,” he whispered. “Don’t you dare wake him up.”

            “See, man, isn’t this just about the cutest thing you could imagine?”

            The flush on Rōfu’s cheeks made Lin want to reach out and brush his fingers across them. He wanted to keep the boy safe. He wanted—cold-water-shock to the back of his neck. Somehow, he made himself laugh again. “Cute? I suppose so, Sir Shō. He’s certainly more your area than mine.”

            Shō gave him an amused sideways look. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

            “Nothing,” Lin babbled hurriedly. “I should go back and think. We have a curse to attend to, don’t we?”

            He swept back out of the room, shaking his head. Definitely time to get back to this intriguing puzzle. Clearly, he was too bored right now; it was leading to truly peculiar and unpredictable responses to perfectly normal situations.

            A short meeting with Hotaru and discussion about the old stories of the hero Hikaru gave him a reasonably small part of the city to search; he made a simple map and annotated it. He was about to set out into the bright sunlit streets when Shō wandered out and asked where he was going.

            “Probably better if you don’t go alone, man,” he pointed out mildly once Lin had explained. Lin rolled his eyes, tempted to simply vanish in a puff of smoke, but then Shō might start wandering off by himself instead. Shō was a terrible trouble magnet, and Lin needed to make sure nothing dreadful happened to the Night of Mourning. “…fine,” he grumbled. “As long as you can keep up with me.”

            The first thing he did, with Shō trailing along behind him, was try to leave. They followed the same main thoroughfare they had run up the night before. The bridge at the base of the hill trailed off into a cloud of white fog, which Lin poked at carefully with his pipe before entering. A moment later he was walking out of it next to Shō, on the same side he’d left. “Hmmm,” he hummed interestedly.

            “What?” Shō asked.

            “I am fairly certain I never turned around. Here. Hold still.” He took Shō’s hand, ignoring the other man’s soft intake of breath, and stepped back into the fog. This time he was able to continue into the chilly dimness up until the point that their hands went taut in each other. Shō’s hand was quite large and very calloused, although the pattern of calluses themselves was—interesting—Lin thought to himself that he would like to explore those calluses at length on some other occasion. He glanced back, but though he could feel Shō’s hand warm in his own, he could see nothing but the gentle whiteness of the fog surrounding him. “Hmmm.” With an odd clenching of his chest, Lin let go and stood quite still. Around him was nothing but that strange white fog; he could neither hear nor see anything other than the odd static.

            He took a single step forward and was standing next to Shō again. “Well,” he said meditatively. “I do believe that confirms that, at the very least, leaving may pose a challenge.”

            Shō cracked his neck from side to side. “That’s weird,” he said. “Should I try?”

            “For now, I would rather explore the entire area. We can return later.”

            Nod. One of Shō’s odd little smiles. Lin had caught him watching Rōfu with a smile like that hovering on his lips, and he wasn’t certain what to do with one directed towards himself, so he ignored it and led them toward the area Hotaru had indicated as being at least orally associated with the grave of the hero Hikaru. Although the rest of the town sported a relatively normal architectural style for any reasonably-sized collection of people living together, in the area in the southernmost part, there was a collection of rubble just beyond the southern bridge. Lin couldn’t be certain, but he suspected it dated from before the War of the Fading Dusk at the very least. There was nothing much left but a set of three low, crumbling stone walls and a lopsided spillage of large blocks that might once have formed a floor beneath. Lin inspected them thoughtfully, running his fingers across them, testing their remaining structural stability, and finally getting down on his hands and knees and crawling across them. It took quite some time, but eventually he found a slightly sunk place where the color of the stone changed.

            “You got something?” Shō asked with interest, and Lin spared a moment to wonder how he’d known.

            “I believe so,” he responded, pressing down lightly on the central stone, which shifted slightly. “Can I borrow some of your famed strength?”

            “I’m pretty sure you’re strong enough to do this yourself,” grumbled Shō, but he leaned over Lin and put his hands on the stone as well. Instead of moving to the other side, he literally put his hands on either side of the Enigmatic Gale’s. After the first shock of warmth at his back, Lin realized his hands were shaking slightly, and he forced himself to file the reaction away from later perusal and focus on the task at hand.

Under pressure from both of them, the stone rocked back and forth like a loose tooth. They didn’t have much leverage, unfortunately, but after about five minutes of working—five minutes that left Lin peculiarly overheated for what really qualified as a minimum of work—they managed to open a small, dark hole at one side of the rock. “Scoot over, man,” Shō told him. “I’ll get it up.” He gave Lin a gentle shove to the side and then unsheathed his painted sword.

            Lin observed him with interest as he inserted the stick into the hole they’d made and grunted slightly as he levered it up, the muscles cording out in his neck. Lin could, if he tried, almost sense the flow of _qi_ through his veins, so strong was it. Even if he hadn’t been able to, the bright yellow glow haloing the makeshift sword would have made it clear what Shō was doing.

            It took another few minutes, but he managed to get the stick angled in beneath the stone block and, by straining, levered it up out of the hole. Lin gave a pleased exclamation: revealed beneath was a set of moss-covered stone stairs, leading downwards into a musty-smelling ancient darkness.

            Before they could actually enter whatever this place was, they had to clear a few more stones aside, but that took a comparatively short amount of time. As soon as there was a large enough entryway, Lin took out his pipe and ignited it. The little spark shone like a miniature sun, brightening the darkened walls of an old, smooth corridor made out of reddish stone. “Come along, then!” he said lightly to Shō, who grunted but followed.

            The corridor soon forked, and Lin took out his map to annotate their passage carefully. It wouldn’t do for them to become lost.

            After a while, Lin started to feel something prickling on the back of his neck. A careful inspection of the surroundings revealed nothing, but that wasn’t enough to know for certain that they were safe. Still, after nothing happened but him feeling progressively more and more unpleasant, he turned to Shō, stopping so suddenly that the other man nearly ran into his back. The fact that he managed to stop himself, in fact, caused Lin to feel an obscure sort of disappointment. “Tell me a story,” he demanded, tossing his long hair back into Shō’s face.

            Shō sputtered. “What?” he said. “Oh, come on, man.”

            “I want to hear a story,” Lin said. “Please, Sir Shō?” He paused, swinging around and raising his pipe so that Shō could see the very pathetic face he was putting on. He received a scowl in answer.

            “You’re gonna complain incessantly otherwise, aren’t you?” Shō sighed. “Okay, okay. I’m not much of a storyteller, though.”

            “I promise not to judge you too harshly,” Lin replied, and he leaned forward daringly to flick Shō’s nose. He hadn’t realized he was going to do that, and both of them paused for an instant, unsure. It wasn’t so much the action that had disconcerted him, Lin thought, as he attempted to corral his thoughts to reassess what was happening; it wasn’t even the fact he hadn’t planned it. It was the fact that the simple touch recalled a moon-silvered moment, the image of pale skin and red hair sprawled out in front of him as he touched and touched—“Well, go on, then,” he said, a little flatly, and he turned away from Shō again, not sure that he was in full command of his facial expressions, which was quite an uncomfortable feeling.

            “Okay, okay,” Shō grumbled. “Once, a long time ago, there was a—prince.”

            “Was he a very handsome prince with long white hair?” Lin asked, pausing to inspect another doorway. After a brief moment of deliberation, he beckoned Shō in with him.

            “Yeah,” Shō agreed after a pause. “A totally wicked, evil, and very handsome prince.”

            “But very clever, surely. _Ah—_ ” The final exclamation came as he held his pipe high, illuminated a high-ceilinged stone chamber. This was no rough stone corridor: the floor was tiled in startling mosaics of blue and gold, and two tall, sturdy, marble guardians stood on either side of the door at the other end. “ _Very_ clever,” Lin said smugly.

            A hand on his head made him startle and look up. Shō was giving him a peculiar smile, ruffling a hand through his hair. “Guess so,” he agreed. “What’s all this, anyway?”

            “At a guess, I would say beyond that door is the tomb of our hero.” He strode forward, stopping with interest in front of the solid, ornate stone nestled in its archway. “It may be somewhat difficult for us to gain entry, however. Hm.” He frowned. There was something beyond that door, he was certain. The shadows seemed especially thick at the base of it, and there was a kind of taut, coiled tension that Lin could feel beyond. Unfortunately, a cursory inspection revealed nothing that could be used as an opening device. “Continue your story,” the Enigmatic Gale instructed Shō. “I will assess our options as regards our ability to enter here.”

            Shō leaned forward suspiciously and rapped on the door. “There’s definitely something back there,” he said. Then he shrugged and leaned against the nearby wall. “Okay. Story. Sure.”

            The moments wound on as Lin listened to Shō’s rather quaint tale of the young prince who offended an immortal and was cursed to wander the earth as a beggar until he found true love. Lin had half-expected that Shō was going to continue to tease him, but the story itself was actually fairly compelling, a welcome distraction as he ran his hands over every inch of the door, trying to find a clue to a hidden mechanism or enchantment that might allow them to open it. It was an oddly soothing interlude, so soothing, in fact, that Lin blinked his eyes with a start at some point and came back to himself to realize he had no notion of the passage of time.

            “How late is it?” he asked abruptly. Shō blinked as well, as if coming out of a long daze.

            “Oh, uh…” he paused. “I dunno.”

            The shadows were stirring at the base of the door, in a way that made Lin think uncomfortably of a creature awakening from slumber. “I think, perhaps, we should retreat, Sir Shō,” Lin said slowly. “We have been here for quite some time, and it would be as well to assess the state of the day outside.”

            “Yeah,” Shō agreed. “Yeah, definitely.”

            As the two of them hurried back through the corridor, Lin thought he could feel a pair of eyes boring into the back of his neck, and he had the uncomfortable sensation of balancing on the blade of a knife.

            They re-emerged, blinking, to find that somehow they had spent nearly the entire day belowground. Twilight was threatening on all sides; the shadows were lengthening, creeping along the ground like living things. “I wonder if we were meant to stay down there,” Lin said, meditatively.

            Shō grabbed his hand. “Not really the time, man, let’s run!”

            They pelted over the southern bridge, running back up the central road. Lin spared a moment to wonder what exactly would happen if they tried to enter the fog _now_ , whether it would still be that same featureless white, or if there would be streaks of darkness threading through it, like ink bleeding into a pristine sheet of paper.

            The orange light of the dying sun stretched their own shadows beside them as they raced up the deserted main street. At the top of it was the shrine, a bright golden doorway around which darkness was already coiling. Standing in the entryway was a crimson figure that made Lin’s heart bump in a confusing kind of way.

~

The shadows lengthened as Shō and Lin ran for the doorway of the shrine. Rōfu stood holding it open, beckoning them desperately. Shō glanced sideways to see that his companion still had a bright smile on his face.

            “Figures you’d still be grinning even when we’re running for our lives,” he growled out.

            “I’ve never had a chance to race the sun before,” Lin told him, increasing his speed a little. “As it turns out, it’s quite invigorating!”

            They barreled across the threshold as the last gleam of sun winked out beneath the horizon. “Good thing you guys—” Ryouga started before being interrupted by a surprised cry from Rōfu. The wind had caught one of his trailing scarves and carried it out into the inky darkness of the night. He stumbled as something unseen tugged at it, pulling him off-balance, and Shō wasn’t close enough to catch him as he reached out with his free hand, trying to grab something.

            Lin was, and for a moment their hands closed around each other. Shō saw an expression of something that might have been concern flash into Lin’s eyes as his muscles tightened, trying to hold on. There was an instant when they were balanced, one against the other, and then Lin gave a pained cry as Rōfu was torn from his grasp and carried backwards out the doorway of the shrine into the waiting night. The door slammed shut behind him.

            Shō stared blankly at the space where his best friend had disappeared. “Damn,” Lin panted beside him. “Damn.”

            “What happened?” The priest they had met upon their first entry to Yami ran in from the back as Shō managed to get his frozen limbs to move and headed for the door. “What are you doing? Don’t!”

            Lin caught his arm. “Don’t be foolish,” he said harshly. “The Princess will have to take care of himself. You can’t put everyone sheltering in here in danger.”

            Shō hated the fact that what Lin was saying made sense. He almost rounded on the other man, but managed to restrain himself, gripping the hilt of his wooden sword tightly and taking several deep breaths. “The Princess?” he echoed, and was surprised to see a flush appear on Lin’s cheeks.

            “Ah, well.” He made a motion to his head. “The headpiece he always wears.” He hissed in pain, grabbing for his wrist with his other hand.

            “What’s the matter, man?” Shō focused on something he _could_ help with.

            “Nothing much,” Lin said quietly, raising his fingers to reveal his palm was bloodied where he had pressed it against the other arm, the side and back of which were marred with deep gashes. He and Rōfu had held onto each other so hard that when the bard was torn away, his claws had left bloody furrows down the side and back of Lin’s arm.

**~**

            Something howled about Rōfu’s ears, and he set his teeth, raised Ryouga, and brought his claws down. Bright red-pink light leapt into existence in a shell around him as he raised his voice in song, but all it illuminated was a few crushed stalks of grass at his feet, nothing in the pure void of darkness beyond.

            But Rōfu didn’t need light to see. Whatever creature was out there, he could meet and turn back, with nothing more than the touch of its vibrations against the ground. He shut his eyes to avoid the distraction and continued to sing, tracing out his location and surroundings by sound.

            The trees lining the streets and the cobbles underfoot told him little; it was probably some part of the town, but he couldn’t be certain which part.

            “Well, this isn’t great, huh,” Ryouga said as Rōfu strummed him rapidly, fingers flying across the strings. He was already feeling the strain of it, more than he should have been, as if something about the incomprehensible darkness around them were sapping his strength.

            At least it was only him. At least, he thought, Shō and Lin were safe. With Rōfu’s eyes shut, there was nothing for him to see but what was there, and yet for an instant twists of white hair filled his vision, and the last thing he had seen before he was carried bodily backwards out of the shrine, Lin’s face burned into his vision, eyes stripped of their usual amusement, mouth open, in an expression Rōfu might almost have called ‘dawning horror.’

            “We made it through the Wasteland of Spirits,” Rōfu said. “We can do this.”

            He walked slowly but steadily along the cobbles, orienting himself based on the slope of the street around them. There should have been a moon and stars, but if he opened his eyes, there was nothing beyond his tiny, solitary pink sphere but a swirling, inky blackness.

            It was growing cold as he made his way back up the street, but there was sweat standing out on Rōfu’s forehead. There was no doubt: whatever this darkness was made of, it was sapping his strength, nibbling at the edges of his _qi_ , even as he shielded himself from the brunt of it. If he lost consciousness, there was a very good chance he would die rapidly. So he wouldn’t lose consciousness, then, he thought. He wouldn’t leave Shō.

            He made his way back up the hill, the cold still slowly seeping in as he sang, his voice rising strong and bright—but, even though there was plenty for it to echo from, he could hear almost no echo. The vibrations it made were faint, as if he were walking on soft carpet. Was that because of some change in the quality of the darkness itself, or was it because he was already starting to fade? He had to hope it was the former.

            Reaching the shrine, he paused. If he concentrated very hard, he could hear, over the still strong jangle and hum of his own song, Shō’s and Lin’s voices from within.

            “—almost think you cared.” Shō, sounding tired and strained.

            “Ridiculous.” Lin’s voice was light as ever. Rōfu paused, his heart burning with longing for both of them, for the soft touch of Shō’s hand on his shoulder and the sharp twinging pain of Lin’s teeth in his neck.

            “You actually kinda like that guy now, don’t you?” Ryouga asked, and Rōfu nodded, unwilling to lie to Ryouga and himself under the current, potentially-lethal circumstances. Lin was frustrating and perhaps untrustworthy, but he was also intelligent, quick-witted, and occasionally kind. Shō, though—

            Was he to die without confessing his feelings? Until now, it had always seemed better to wait. Better to avoid embarrassing Shō. Even waking to find himself alone in Seiyuu, even then, his only thought had been to _find_ Shō and to keep him safe. It was only recently that it had occurred to him that he could _tell_ Shō, and he had thought—better to wait. Silence had always been easier for Rōfu than speech. And perhaps if he died it would be better that Shō not mourn him so deeply as he might if by some miracle, his feelings were returned. Yet it ached; more than fear tightening in his chest there was the frustration of knowing that if he died here, Shō would never know.

            Could they hear him from inside or was there something about this darkness that would swallow the sound of his song? There was nothing to do but try. He steadied Ryouga in his hands and played louder, shutting his eyes hard and letting the music flow through him. Playing like this, he could feel it as it struck the darkness, and he could feel as the darkness nibbled it away. Shō’s and Lin’s voices faded from his ears, and perhaps that was for the best anyway. If they could hear him, they might put the children in danger trying to get to him. Rōfu tried not to stumble with disappointment as he turned away from the shrine.

            As he raised Ryouga again, he heard the metallic sound of a blade being drawn from its sheath.

~

            It was a long night. The children asked where Rōfu was. Shō told them. They cried, even after he told them that Rōfu was smart and strong and magical. Lin vanished entirely for a good ten minutes sometime in the middle of the night, which made Shō nearly frantic. He had almost become certain that Lin had actually taken himself outside when he stumbled over the Enigmatic Gale smoking behind the altar, practically invisible inside his own cloud of smoke.

            “There you are,” Shō grumbled, trying not to show the relief on his face. “The kids are crying.”

            “I am not good with children,” Lin said bluntly.

            Shō folded his arms and gave Lin a sideways look. “You seemed fine with them when you were busy trying to tell stories about me.”

            “Somewhat different circumstances, I think you’ll find.”

            “By which you mean you weren’t worried as hell. Look, man—”

            Lin’s red eyes snapped up to meet his. The redness seemed almost to be leaking out of the iris to slowly permeate the whole eye. “I’m not worried,” he said. “Either your little bard will be fine, or he will not be.”

            “Right.” Shō rolled his eyes. Bad enough that he didn’t _know_ what was happening to Rōfu; bad enough that his best friend might be dead; he didn’t also need Lin to be pretending callousness, especially when it led to him hiding and nearly sending Shō out of his mind. He wasn’t used to having two traveling companions. How was he supposed to make sure they were _both_ safe? It was way more stressful than anything Shō had dealt with before. Commanding an army was easier. “Look,” he said, finally. “Just—don’t go anywhere, okay?”

            “Where exactly do you think I could go?”

            Shō rumbled in irritation but let him be. The rest of the night consisted in stalking back and forth to attempt (clumsily) to comfort the children and double check to make sure Lin actually did stay put. The entire exercise left Shō exhausted by the time dawn rolled round, but that didn’t stop him from heading for the door as soon as Hotaru proclaimed that it was safe to open. Lin met him at the threshold, a cloud of smoke still hovering around him.

            What would they find? Shō tried not to think about that too hard. At least the town was pretty small; it wouldn’t take them that long to search all of it. “You go that way,” he said brusquely, indicating the left. “I’ll take downhill.”

            Nod, and then they were off, both of them, all of Shō’s mind taken up with finding his friend. He hurried down the slope, going from sidestreet to sidestreet, pushing past the people who were starting to venture outside. He paused occasionally to ask if they’d seen a bard in red. Most people shook their heads, several of them fearful, several of them with a guarded, pitying sorrow in their eyes. Shō didn’t need their pity. Rōfu had made it through worse.

            “He’s here!” Shō found himself running almost before he’d processed the sound of Lin’s surprisingly concerned cry. He caught up to the Enigmatic Gale at the center of a small wooden bridge across a sluggishly-running stream. Rōfu lay huddled in the center, Ryouga slanted sideways across his lap, in a welter of crimson robes.

            “Is he—” It was hard for Shō’s mouth to form the words.

            Lin’s hand was on Rōfu’s pulse, an expression of sincere concentration pinching his usually vacant countenance. “He’s not dead,” he said finally. “I can feel his heart beating.”

            “Ah.” Shō went to his knees and gathered Rōfu up in his arms, feeling the heavy weight of him, the faint hint of warmth that still clung to him.

            “We thought you guys would never get here,” Ryouga’s voice said faintly from Rōfu’s lap. “Heh. Wasn’t a great night.” Rōfu’s eyes fluttered slightly, but in the end they stayed shut. Holding him like this, Shō could feel that his _qi_ was faint and weak, almost spent.

            “Let’s get him back to the shrine,” Lin said. “I will make a strengthening potion and examine him.”

            “Yeah,” Shō agreed. He brushed Rōfu’s hair tenderly out of his eyes, letting his hand linger in front of Rōfu’s mouth and nose to feel the faint warmth of his shallow breaths. The bard curled against him, and Shō held him gently.

            They walked back to the shrine in silence, with not even Ryouga or Lin trying to talk. The pipa remained mostly quiescent, and Lin spent his time hovering and poking at Rōfu with his pipe, until Shō had to tell him to back off or they wouldn’t be getting anywhere at any point.

            Eventually, they made it back to the shrine, where Lin shooed Shō and everyone else out of the back room as he examined Rōfu. He would have told them to take Ryouga as well, but the pipa made it very clear that if he were separated from Rōfu, there would be unpleasant consequences.

            Shō paced up and down in front of the altar. Hotaru made him a cup of tea, which he pretended to drink. _Rōfu_ , Shō thought. His quiet companion, the man who had crossed the Wasteland of Spirits to find him. They might not have traveled together constantly in Seiyuu, but for years, Rōfu had been there when Shō had needed him. The thought of actually losing him made Shō want to beat his head against the wall.

            Fortunately for his brains, it wasn’t long before Lin emerged from the back room, looking serious but not devastated. “Well?” Shō demanded. “How is he?”

            “Ah, well.” Lin shuffled, looking almost awkward. “You see, Sir Shō, there are a few possibilities. The potion I gave him will replenish his strength to an extent, yes, but…it is insufficient to restore the majority of what he lost. If he chooses to wait, he may recuperate over the course of some months, but I suspect he would prefer a swifter solution.”

            “Okay, so _is_ there a swifter solution?”

            “Whatever the creature or thing that drained him was clearly associated with darkness and _yin_. I believe it may also have had some association with the element of water. In order to counteract that, the long route, as I mentioned, would be to imbue him with _yan_ , probably via rest and sunlight. But it might also be that he might be rapidly, um,” Lin actually stumbled over his words, “filled by someone whose _qi_ was sufficiently associated with fire.”

            “Filled?”           

            “Ah. Yes.” Lin gave him a swift smile. “You might sleep with him, in other words.”

            “Whoa, man, what?”

            “I’d be happy to give you some pointers,” Lin said, recovering his normal poise and smiling broadly. “He prefers to be penetrated, which is good, since for this particular—”           

            Shō put a hand on his forehead. “And how exactly do you know that?”

            “The same way I know most things. Experience.”

            “So…you and Rōfu…?” That wasn’t exactly where Shō had expected the bard’s tastes to run, but he wasn’t about to judge.

            “Jealous?” Lin asked, with a long drag on his pipe.

            “Not particularly.” Shō scratched the back of his head. “As long as you’re treating him all right, man.” He paused, returning to the current topic of conversation. “But then wouldn’t it make sense for you to do it?”

            “I have very little fire in me,” Lin responded, with a suggestive flutter of his eyelashes. “Unfortunately. Therefore, it falls to you. Of course, I am perfectly capable of instructing.”

            “ _Instructing_?” Shō wasn’t sure he believed what he was hearing.

            Taking a long draw on his pipe, Lin favored him with a winning smile. “Certainly.”

            “Look, man, let’s—let’s just ask Rōfu what he wants, okay?”

            “Whatever you think is best.”

~

            When Rōfu blinked his eyes open again, it was to find that he was lying on soft grass with bright sunlight pouring down on him. Someone was stroking his hair. “Okay, so…” Shō’s voice, sounding faintly awkward. Lin flopped down beside him, smiling widely, which meant—it was Shō who was touching his hair.

            He tried to sit up, but couldn’t throw off the lethargy soaking into his limbs and ended up flopping back onto the grass with a soft groan. “How are you feeling, man?”

            “Tired,” Rōfu croaked. The sunlight was nice, and the feeling of Shō’s fingers in his hair was more than he’d ever expected to feel.

            “Ah, yeah, I bet.” Shō’s hand was very gentle. Rōfu thought he could die happy at the touch of those rough fingers. “So, uh…Lin thinks we might have a shortcut on dealing with that problem.”

            “A shortcut?” Ryouga echoed for him. “I guess that means this guy’s not going to die?”

            “Of course not!” Lin said, sounding affronted. “How could you have so little faith in me as to assume I would allow a patient of mine to die?”

            Rōfu squinted at him, the memory of Lin’s face the night before still seared into his mind. There was none of that concern there now, just his usual blank, sleepy expression. But the mask had cracked, Rōfu thought, just for an instant. “What kind of shortcut?” he asked.

            Shō grunted.

            “Ah,” Lin trilled. “Well, you see—” he ran a finger down the side of Rōfu’s face. “Alchemically speaking, your fire has been nearly put out entirely. It is only thanks to your strength that you were not killed. I’ve given you some potions that should help, but I’m afraid they won’t be able to counter the primary problem. You will recover in time, but it might take months of lying in the sun.”

            _Months_. Rōfu’s stomach turned over.

            “But, as Shō says, I think I have a shortcut!” Lin spun his pipe dramatically in one hand and then gestured towards Shō himself.

            “Anything,” Rōfu managed, before Ryouga could even try to speak for him.

            “Wonderful,” Lin said, with a chuckle and a glance at Shō. “Sir Shō?”

            “ _Tell him what it is,_ ” Shō growled, and Rōfu glanced back in bemusement to see that red was staining Shō’s cheeks.

            “Ah—” Lin smiled. “Well, you see, Sir Shō needs to get some fire _inside_ you, so…”

            He couldn’t mean that the way it sounded, could he? The spacey smile on Lin’s face gave no indication of the thoughts lurking beneath his countenance, but the fact that Shō was getting redder than ever definitely suggested something. Rōfu groaned, letting his head fall back. “He says you don’t have to do that for him,” Ryouga said, sounding unusually serious.

            “Hey, man, look at me.” Shō’s large hand cupped his cheek. “It’s not like it would be a trial for me, I just don’t want you to be uncomfortable. I know you and Lin are—”

            _What_. Rōfu’s eyes snapped open again. How did he _know_ —how did he—Lin’s wide smile had gotten even wider. “Ah, well, I wanted him to feel that there would be some expertise involved—”

            “You fucking asshole,” snarled Ryouga. “What the fuck would you do that for?”

            “Don’t stress yourself out, man, I don’t care.” Rōfu’s heart sank again, because of course he didn’t. “Why would I mind you guys doing something that comes naturally?”

            “You’re not even a little bit jealous, Sir Shō?” Lin put in, a slight edge in his voice.

            “Man, what’s the point of being jealous about this?” Shō’s hand was still very tender in his hair. “People like who they like. I mean, I guess I hope you’ve been washing the blankets. I don’t wanna be sleeping on your—”

            Rōfu choked frantically, partway between laughter and tears. “Well,” Lin said, his voice turning a little dark. “If you didn’t sleep so heavily, you would have been welcome to join us at any time.”

            Pause. Beat. “Ah,” Shō said slowly. “Rōfu?”

            The pipa waited a minute for Rōfu to sort out his feelings before he spoke. “Man, this guy woulda fucked you in a heartbeat if he thought you wanted him. He’s been in love with you for years.”

            There was another pause. “I feel kind of stupid now,” Shō said, meditatively, after a few agonizing minutes. “So then I guess it makes a lot of _sense_ to do this, huh?”

            Rōfu blinked at him, still not quite sure what he was getting at. “Ah, man,” Shō said, scratching the back of his neck. “I’m no good at talking about this kind of thing.” He tipped Rōfu’s chin up and pressed their lips together. His scrubby beard was a weird contrast to Lin’s soft, clean-shaven face, not that Rōfu minded. The kiss was careful, tentative and thorough, so thorough that Rōfu found after a long minute that he was moaning into Shō’s mouth, tracing his tongue around Shō’s lips, tangling his hands in Shō’s long, coarse hair.

            “That felt good,” Shō remarked as he pulled back. “Okay, so how do we do this? Lin, you’re the expert.”

            “I would recommend starting by disrobing,” Lin said with some amusement. “That’s generally how I start out.”

            Shō laughed and began to undo his belt. “I sure am glad you’re here, man, I would never have thought of that one.” Rōfu tried to reach up to undo his own clothes, but it was like trying to move against heavy tar.

            “Ah, if you will allow me, I can do that?” Lin’s gentle hands reached for his chest, and Rōfu nodded minutely. He would do anything to be rid of this feeling, he thought, he really would: having Shō—having Shō willing to do something like _this_ was beyond anything he could possibly have dreamed of. He hated the weakness of it, and he was somewhat unsure about how he felt about Lin’s presence, but other than that, it was, quite literally, a dream come true.

            Lin had him out of his clothes almost as quickly as Shō had disrobed, and he was lying naked beneath Shō’s eyes. “Here,” Lin said. “You’ll need this to prepare him.” He paused, and Rōfu followed his gaze to Shō’s groin. “Oho,” Lin said, prodding at Shō’s cock with his pipe—“OI!” Shō said angrily—“You will definitely need to prepare him with great care. I do not boast such an impressive member.”

            “Let’s say I don’t have a lot of experience with this,” Shō said. “And I don’t wanna hurt him. What’s—”

            Lin sighed impatiently. “Oil on your hands, fingers inside him. If you get him to relax, you might be able to go in without the fingers, but I wouldn’t advise it. He tends to tighten up when he’s nervous.” He leered, and Rōfu glared at him.

            “Hey.” Shō ran a large, gentle hand down Rōfu’s stomach, and he melted at the touch. After a moment, he felt Shō’s finger circling his entrance, covered in the usual slick oil, but warmer than Lin’s had ever been. He was also more hesitant than Lin generally was, just rubbing gently around the outer edge until Rōfu whined with impatience at how oversensitive the skin had become.

            “He’s not _that_ fragile,” Lin sighed. “Here.” Two of Shō’s fingers were pushed inside him, and Rōfu moaned at that. “Better,” Lin said. “For a moment I was afraid I was going to have to use my pipe.”

            “Hey, wait, what?” Ryouga protested on Rōfu’s behalf.

            “Better yet,” Lin said lightly. “What about the pipa?”

            “Okay, man, that is enough.” Shō elbowed Lin to the side, causing the Enigmatic Gale to let out an indignant huff, and began to thrust his fingers in earnest.

            Rōfu let out a soft moan, still too tired to do much more than lie back limply and enjoy the feeling. His legs were trembling weakly, but even if Shō’s fingers were clumsier than Lin’s had been the first time, it still felt really good. And it was _Shō_.

            There were soft hands in his hair, carefully combing through it. “Stroke him,” Lin instructed calmly, sounding faintly amused. “He seems quite relaxed, but it won’t hurt to make certain.”

            Shō’s other hand on his erection made Rōfu’s hips twitch in entreaty. There was so much. “Keep it up, he’s loving this,” Ryouga told the other two.

            “How _do_ you always know what he’s thinking?” Lin’s voice asked, sharp with curiosity.

            “I mean it’s pretty damn obvious,” the pipa pointed out. He paused, and Rōfu reached up and stroked down one of the strings, a gentle allowance. “You trust him that much?” Lin’s face the night before, the still-swollen gouges visible on his arm. Rōfu nodded weakly. “We have an understanding,” the pipa said. “I’m his voice, I guess you could say.”

            “Fascinating,” Lin observed cheerfully. Rōfu gasped and strained against Shō’s hand.

            “Please,” he managed to get out.

            “Ah, I think he’s ready for you.” Often, Lin tried to tease him, ask him if he was sure, or if he needed another finger—the fact he wasn’t doing that now surprised Rōfu a little. Was he still worried? Or did he just not want to tease Rōfu too much in front of Shō? Well, either way—

            “You sure about that, man?” For a moment, Rōfu thought Shō was addressing Lin, and then he realized those concerned dark eyes were looking right at him. He nodded again, managing a small smile. “All right. Try to relax.”

            “Get his thighs up,” Lin said. “Here—” A soft bundle was pushed under his hips. “That should help.” Two sets of hands lifted his thighs up and put his ankles over Shō’s shoulders.

            “You gotta tell me to stop if it hurts,” Shō said. “Okay?”

            Rōfu nodded weakly again, biting his lip at the sensation of Shō’s erection pressing at his entrance.

            “All right.”

            “Just go steadily, not too hard, but not too slow,” Lin advised.

            “R-Right,” Shō panted. Rōfu forced himself to relax as Shō slowly pressed into him. He hadn’t realized how cold he was until he felt the heat of Shō’s length slide inside him. His breath stuttered a little at the size of the other man—quite a bit bigger than Lin, who was his only other point of comparison. “Hey,” Shō said. Instead of stopping, as Rōfu had been afraid he might, he stroked a gentle hand down the inside of his thigh. “I got you.”

            Rōfu gasped at the trail of warmth that ignited in the wake of the touch of Shō’s hand, then gasped again as Shō’s hips pressed into the base of his thighs. He was aching with the sensation of fullness; he thought he might burst into flames from the heat of it. “Okay?” Shō asked again, and Rōfu nodded, forcing his breath out again, feeling his legs trembling.

            “He’s doing well, aren’t you?” Lin’s lips brushed against his forehead, and he realized his head was pillowed in Lin’s lap. Lin’s fingers brushed down Ryouga’s strings, and Rōfu shuddered a little at the low, pleasant tone.

            “All right.” Shō started to move, his thrusts as slow and lazy as everything else he did. Rōfu watched him, watched the way his dark hair swung forward and back with the motion, the way his forehead scrunched up a bit when he bottomed out, the little exhale he made as he pulled partway out and then pushed back in. Every motion was accompanied with a little swell of heat in the base of Rōfu’s stomach.

            He was moaning, he realized a moment later, a series of breathy, faintly musical notes escaping from his throat without his consent. The heat was building and building, as if the flames were building inside him, the only contrast the three little spots of icy cold on his forehead where Lin’s hand rested.

            “Ah,” Shō’s voice, rough and broken and a little desperate. Rōfu liked hearing that; he hooked his ankles behind Shō’s neck to pull him closer. “Hey—” Shō said in surprise. “Did he just—”

            Rōfu heard Lin’s breath catch in his throat, felt a sudden tremor run through the Enigmatic Gale’s limbs. “Rōfu, how are you feeling?” Lin asked with an intensity the bard hadn’t expected. Rōfu tilted his head at him in confusion, plucking a few notes out on Ryouga. “Seems like he’s doing a little better,” Ryouga said. “Wasn’t he supposed to be?”

            “Of course,” Lin said, so smoothly that if Rōfu hadn’t felt him tremble, he might have believed the lie. “Go on, you’re doing well.”

            “Damn, man, you saying that is almost enough to make me stop,” Shō said, but he continued thrusting, a little harder now; Rōfu tipped his head back into Lin’s lap and shifted his hips back against him. The change in angle was enough to strike something deep inside him, to send sparks flashing in front of his eyes and draw another desperate moan from his lips. “ _Ah_ ,” Shō groaned, and his hands tightened on the tops of Rōfu’s thighs. “Ah—I’m gonna—”

            Rōfu nodded frantically and managed to get out a strangled, “ _please_ ,” which overlapped with Lin’s blunt instruction to “come inside him, then.”

            “You could be a little niiicer about it, man,” Shō grumbled, but he thrust twice more and then groaned, “ah, shit,” and Rōfu felt the heat inside him swell until it was an inferno, shut his eyes and felt his heels clenching around the back of Shō’s neck. An ember inside him that had slowly been flickering lower and lower caught and burst back into flame. He cried out and jerked, cold at his back, heat at his front.

            When his vision cleared, Shō was just finishing pulling out of him. “Well,” Shō said. “Guess it’s a good thing we didn’t do this indoors, huh.”

            Blinking, the sheer exhaustion faded, Rōfu rolled up shakily onto his elbow. Lin’s hair was windblown, the grass across the hillside flattened, and several of the nearby trees were snapped in half, canted over at extreme angles. Rōfu put a hand to his throat. “Uh,” said Ryouga. “Whoops?”

~

            The wavering light of the candles was starting to get rather tiresome, Lin thought irritably. And he was chafing at the inability to leave the town. A storm should not be battened within four walls. At least the bard was feeling better. Lin looked down at him, his body slumped in sleep, curled around the pipa. He was quite lovely, like this. Lin was glad he wasn’t dead. He had dreamed, briefly, dozing, the night before, of Rōfu’s form vanishing into the darkness, had woken to a reality where the dream wasn’t a dream. Something made him brush the red hair aside from Rōfu’s forehead, and he paused. There were three bleached white splotches just below his hairline, where Lin’s fingers had rested, earlier.

            “He asleep?” Lin jerked back, almost unseating Rōfu from his lap, looking up as Shō walked in.

            “Ah—yes. I imagine he still needs quite a bit of rest after his encounter with whatever lurks in the night’s darkness.”

            “Heh, I’m pretty tired myself.” Shō flopped down beside them. “Looks like you’ve really warmed up to Rōfu, huh?”

            “No!” Lin protested, though he didn’t actually recoil, as they might have unseated Rōfu from his lap. “I’m simply looking out for my own best interests, as always.”

            “Didn’t say you weren’t. He’s a great person to have at your back. He’s saved my life a bunch.”

            “Hmmm.” Lin spun his pipe between his fingers and opted to change the subject. “I take it that we are going to attempt to find the source of this,” he waved a hand, “unpleasantness tomorrow?”

            “If we don’t, more people are gonna get hurt, so…”

            Lin refrained from saying that he didn’t much care if more _people_ got hurt, as long as those people were not Shō or Rōfu. No point upsetting the Edgeless Blade, and, in any case, when he thought of it like that, it made him confused, and confusion was not likely to be helpful in getting them through that final door beneath the town. “Very well,” he said instead. “Perhaps the Princess—Rōfu’s experiences will be useful to us in determining how to fight it. In any case, I am going to sleep. It will be better to be well-rested.”

            “Shove over,” Shō grunted as Lin made to lie down, and, to the Enigmatic Gale’s shock, he lay down as well, on the other side of Lin from Rōfu, and then slung one lazy arm over his shoulders.

            “Ah—what are you doing, Sir Shō?”

            “I’ve been too worried about both of you lately. I’m not letting either of you have a chance to sneak away in the night. Now shut up and go to sleep.”

            Lin opened his mouth but closed it again. Shō’s warm weight at his back was—very pleasant. With a sleepy murmur, Rōfu wriggled back against his front, and Lin slowly found himself relaxing between them. And it was, in its own way, a good way of making sure he knew where the other two were. Yes, if he thought of it like that, the situation even had strategic value, Lin told himself vaguely, as he floated away into the warmth of sleep.

~

            The sweet notes of a flute floated through the air, and Rōfu was awake. He felt sleepy, well-rested, and warm. Behind him, someone mumbled and warm breath tickled the back of his neck. With a yawn, he slowly rolled out of the bed. Shō was behind him, snoring, his head pillowed on his arm.

            Smiling, Rōfu raised Ryouga and headed towards the sound of the flute, only to find Lin sitting outside in the early dawn light, with the four children around him as he played on a simple wooden flute. He looked up as Rōfu pushed the door open, and Rōfu saw the denial rising in his face before he cut off whatever justification Lin had this time by joining in with Ryouga, letting the pipa take the lower notes, bolstering the high soulful tones of the flute.

            The children greeted him excitedly, all four of them getting up to cluster around him as he carefully walked towards Lin. He ruffled their hair and smiled at them, then seated himself beside Lin and, after a moment, leaned his head against Lin’s shoulder. Lin’s energy thrummed with a sudden thread of startlement, like a deer about to bolt, but in the end he continued to play. And when had Rōfu become so accustomed to Lin that he could read him that well? Or was Lin deliberately trying to _appear_ —no. There was no point in assuming that. The Enigmatic Gale was dangerous and perhaps even evil, Rōfu thought, but at this point, he had gained the trust of the Song that Dooms Evil.

            They played together for maybe half an hour before Shō wandered out, yawning, and suggested breakfast. He made it for them, chuckled at the children, and gave Rōfu a few unexpectedly tender looks. Lin as well, although Lin’s response was to toss his hair and ignore them. Once they’d eaten, the three of them set out to explore what Lin explained was probably the tomb of the hero Hikaru.

            The stairs winding down into darkness disconcerted Rōfu, although there was nothing obviously supernatural about the shadows. Nevertheless, he held out a hand to stop the other two from going down and instead began to play a rapid set of wild notes on Ryouga, singing quietly as he did, to form a bubble of rose-colored light for all of them.

            “Yeah, probably a good idea,” Shō agreed, squeezing his shoulder briefly, awkwardly. Rōfu tried not to show on his face how warm that made him. He wasn’t sure he succeeded, especially not when he caught a pointed grin from Lin as the Enigmatic Gale slid past him as well.

            They made their way down into a worn stone passageway, their footsteps making very little sound on the soft moss. Rōfu looked around and watched as Lin paused, running his hands across a set of almost effaced stone carvings in the wall. “I should not have missed these the last time,” he murmured.

            Lin led them down and through several more corridors before stopping outside a wider chamber. “In here,” Shō said, and Rōfu was starting to step forward when Lin flung out a hand.

            “Wait!” The other two halted immediately, following Lin’s pointing finger to the strange blackness that pooled in the base of the chamber, quiescent, but not yielding to the soft illumination of Rōfu’s song. Lin squatted in front and poked at it cautiously, first with his pipe, then with one long finger. “Well,” he said, sitting back. “It does not currently appear—aggressive. I am almost certain it was not here the day before yesterday, though.”

            They stepped through it carefully, Rōfu not without feeling a chill; three spots on his forehead burned with icy cold. He moved minutely closer to Shō, not sure whether he was trying to keep him safe with the bright music, or whether he was, himself, seeking shelter and safety. As they approached the door at the other end of the chamber, Lin gave a sharp exclamation. “Ah,” he breathed, kneeling in front of the door. “I should have realized.”

            “Realized what?” Shō asked.

            “There’s an illusion over the door,” Lin said, with a crooked smile. “Rōfu’s music is—burning it away. I imagine due to his encounter with you yesterday.” He shook his head in frustration. “To be able to fool _me_ , of all people.” He clucked his tongue angrily. “Without that, it appears remarkably simple.”

            Straightening up, he tapped his pipe sharply against the stone door. There was a hollow clicking noise, and the door swung slowly open.

            The light of Rōfu’s song illuminated bled over into the darkness inside the underground chamber. At its edges swam those same inky shadows, still relatively sluggish, but swirling in larger whorls now. And in the center was a clay warrior, holding the broken handle of a sword that glittered weirdly along its edges.

            Shō gave a guttural exclamation and strode forward.

            “Watch out!” Lin spun around in a blur of feathers, and a blast of stark white light illuminated him from behind for a moment. Rōfu whipped around to see the crawling shadows had nearly reached Shō, not so quiescent any longer. Lin’s sword was out, and for a long moment he stood straining, his delicate blade caught against another sword that seemed to be made of the writhing darkness beyond. Then he was flung bodily backwards; Rōfu barely made it in time to catch him before he slammed into the wall. “ _Ah_ ,” Lin’s voice gasped out, breathy with pain. There was a long, shallow cut across his collar-bone; the blood looked black in the watery light.

            “Shō!” Supporting Lin with one arm made it hard for Rōfu to lift Ryouga, but he managed it, and the pipa himself helped, rearranging his weight even as he spun into his sword form. The darkness swirled, coalescing into that strange, inky-black sword again, and it struck at the two of them; Rōfu was barely able to catch two of the attacks on Ryouga, stumbling backwards as the rapid strikes threatened to break through his defenses.

            Just when he thought he couldn’t keep it up anymore, there was a yell and Shō interposed himself between them and the sword, his wooden blade unsheathed. The noise of metal-on-qi reverberated through the enclosed chamber. The next two exchanges happened so rapidly that even Rōfu barely saw Shō’s movements in the now-flickering light of his song and Lin’s pipe.

            Shō shouted something over the desperate jangling of Rōfu’s song. Light blossomed at the end of his blade, a rotating yellow-white wheel like a shield with nine bright triangles ringing it. It grew and grew, and the black sword smashed against it in another explosion of raw qi. Rōfu pulled Lin against him as light and shadow boiled up in front of them. Shō’s hair was lifted up and carried backward by the sheer force of the clash.

            “Shut your eyes!” Rōfu instinctively did as Lin told him, and the inside of his lids turned red and then white with the brightness of the explosion. It faded again a moment later; Rōfu coughed and lost his rhythm and the song wavered, but he managed not to stop singing completely, blinking eyes that were somehow stinging despite the fact they had been shut for the worst of whatever had just happened.

            After a moment, his eyes cleared to reveal a lightened chamber. The shadows no longer seemed to creep and writhe and crawl along the walls. There was just the old statue in the center of the chamber with the half of the sword in his hands. Shō was in front of him, holding what looked the blade of it, fitting the two worn silver edges together. “You’ve caused way too much trouble,” he told it. The bright light of Rōfu’s music grew in strength as his voice steadied, illuminating the chamber from wall to wall.

            “What’s that?” Lin asked, his usual sharp curiosity dulled a little, with weariness or pain. Blood trickled sluggishly out of the shallow cut on his collarbone, soaking the usually pristine upper edge of his white shirt a brilliant crimson.

            “It’s a sword,” Shō said, lifting both halves carefully out of the statue’s grasp.

            “Yes, that much I can see,” Lin agreed acidly. “I meant that you seem to have some idea what it has been doing here. I sensed an imbalance corrected when you fitted it back together, but…”

            “Yeah, I dunno exactly.” Shō looked down at the two halves. “I’m guessing this was the holy sword that Hikaru used to defeat whatever demon used to live around here. I don’t know how it got broken, but it looks like half that snapped off was trying to find the other half, basically? The flow of its energies was broken, though, so I guess…it just sort of sucked in light and kept going. Maybe it had some leftover demonic energies sealed into it as well. I wouldn’t be surprised. Either way, what matters is this thing is absolutely going into the Index.”

~

            They bandaged up Lin’s injury before leaving the old tomb. It wasn’t terribly deep, although the Enigmatic Gale was rather sulky about having taken an injury at all. Shō was forced to wonder if it was actually the wound or the fact that he’d transparently taken it while protecting the Edgeless Blade himself. As they passed the bridge where Lin had been unable to leave, they saw that the fog had cleared to reveal the path they had taken the first day they had entered Yami.

            “Still don’t understand how the hell we got in,” Shō grumbled, mostly to himself.

            “Don’t you see,” Lin smirked. Apparently being condescending made him feel better; the color was beginning to come back into his cheeks as he stepped lightly sideways to tap Shō’s head and then the Index itself with the bottom of his pipe. “If the culprit was a sword, it presumably recognized its kindred.” He stared meditatively at the bridge. “I wonder if you would have been able to leave, too?”

            Hotaru and her husband were waiting at the shrine, surrounded by the four wide-eyed children and their tired-looking mother, not quite so tired-looking anymore. One of the little girls ran forward and threw her arms around Rōfu’s knees, and Shō felt a weird tiny pang as the red-haired bard knelt and hugged her.

            “You defeated the demon,” Hotaru said. Although her voice was wobbling a little, it wasn’t a question.

            “Wasn’t exactly a demon,” Shō replied. “Uh, we took care of it, though.”

            “The hero Hikaru sleeps soundly once again,” Lin put in smoothly. “And is once again able to protect this place. I am afraid we three should be moving on, though.”

            “Is there anything we can do to thank you?”

            Shō looked over to where Rōfu now had the littlest girl on his shoulders and was carrying her back and forth in front of her giggling mother. “Nah,” he said. “I got something out of all this I didn’t know I needed.”

            The calm look on Lin’s face slipped just a little. “I don’t suppose you’ll let me get my hands on the Night of Mourning now?” he murmured to Shō.

            “Definitely not, man.” And then Shō reached out and took his hand tightly. “But I’m not letting you go, and I don’t think Rōfu is either.” The bard, his sense of timing impeccable as always, chose that moment to press the child into her mother’s arms and head back towards them.

            “Of course not,” he said. He took Lin’s hand in his left hand and Shō’s in his right and smiled.

            Lin blinked at him. “Ah, well, don’t expect me to stop trying to get the Night of Mourning,” he said quickly.

            “Never,” Shō assured him solemnly, and Rōfu’s hands tightened about theirs.


End file.
